


Traveler

by Rose_Dagger_9194



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Anne is a nurse, Based off of quotes my professor says in our class because hes deep asf, Cultural Anthropology, Fluff, Forgive me about my explanations, Gemma is a writer, Harry is a dancer, I know nothing about dance, Liam is a boxer, Lottie is a model, Louis is an anthropologist, M/M, Niall is a writer, Speaks of traveling, Zayn is an artist, dance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-12
Updated: 2020-02-12
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:08:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22683760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rose_Dagger_9194/pseuds/Rose_Dagger_9194
Summary: Based off of these quotes my professor said so of course I had to write it.~“Movement represents an entire field of consciousness.”“What I can create with this drum, she can create with her body.”“What gives us a reason to say yes to life?”“What you love is worth being vulnerable for.”“We take for granted what we see as reality.”
Relationships: Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson, Harry Styles/Original Male Character(s)
Kudos: 4





	Traveler

Footsteps pounded into the ground, that along with quick breaths filled the empty halls. With the wooden floors and the big open spaces, the sounds echoed loud in the boy’s ears. Weaving through the confusing turns and halls, there eventually came a large staircase to which he rushed up, taking two steps at a time. If this were three months ago, he most likely would have fallen but he had gotten the hang of things around there and he knew the weak spots of these stairs since he has climbed them multiple times a day for the last three months, six times a week. Once he got up and got past everything, there were large doors coming into view and without slowing down, the boy burst through the doors, them slamming open. The echo was the loudest sound made that night. There was no one else in the room and with a flick of a switch, lights slowly started to illuminate the large room.

“No no no…” He whispered to himself and threw a duffel bag down from off his shoulders and walked in, hands going up to cover his face, footsteps now soft against the linoleum flooring. He didn’t have any shoes on either, they were merely wrapped with a tape for now. “That didn’t just happen... That didn’t happen.”

With a soft breath, the boy just tried to calm down and paced around. He had his eyes closed and focused on the sound of his heart in his ears now that there wasn’t anything else to focus on and his adrenaline wasn’t seeping through his veins to cloud his thoughts. He focused in the sound of his heart to calm its beating and then focused on the shifty movements of his eyes behind his closed eyelids to slowly get them to stop moving around as much as they were. All of that calmed him down eventually and he didn’t feel like running right out of the balcony doors and jumping off.

Progress.

“Okay… You’re fine, Harry. Get it together.” Harry breathed out softly, going over to his bag and then moving to kneel down, grabbing out his phone and headphones to put in his ears. He scrolled around through his music and then eventually pressed play on one song, putting his phone in his pocket. He had on a pair of grey sweats that were cuffed at the ankles and then a loose plain white t-shirt. So, he wasn’t able to do a type of dance that he was used to doing, but he could do a hip-hop dance. Which is what the song blasting in his ears was permitting him to do.

Harry stared at himself in the mirrors that made up the walls of the room, nodding his head to the beat before he got in the hang of things and then his upper body move to the beat, arms going in the air. He dragged one hand down his opposite arm and then his body was moving to roll to the side, hands coming down to rest on his chest as he pumped it to the beat. His body just seemed to take over. The countless years of listening to music and studying which part of the body to move to which melody and which beat came as a second nature him. It was so natural. His body moved to each beat even when it seemed sporadic, using one of his legs to plant his foot on the ground and tumble forward in a way to land right on his feet afterwards. He didn’t have set choreography to it, just moving how he felt. Letting his emotions guide the beat instead of the beat taking control of him.

He went to kick off the floor to do an acrobatic flip that would hopefully land him on his feet to end in a slide on one knee while the other foot can plant on the ground to give him the leverage to push back to his feet. However, he knew mid air that his form was not fit for this right yet and instead of landing how he wanted, he almost twisted an ankle and landed right on his back with a thud and a groan left his lips. His eyes closed and he just laid there for a moment because that did hurt. Then again, it wasn’t the first time in his life that he had fucked up, he had countless hospital visits and bruises to prove that alone.

What he wasn’t expecting was a hand to be placed against one of his shoulders. It made his eyes snap open and a frantic move to sit up, eyes wide and staring at this man kneeling next to him. His lips were moving but nothing came out of his mouth and then was when Harry realized he still had his headphones in his ears. He instantly reached up and yanked them out of his ears and reached in his pocket to turn his music off. “Oops!”

The man merely smiled when Harry looked back at him. “Hi...”

“Hi?” Harry said back but ended with a tilt in his voice that caused him to end it in a question.

“Are you alright?” The man spoke, sitting down besides Harry and had one leg spread out while the other was bent with his arms wrapping around it.

“Oh, um... Yes. Yeah. I’m fine. I actually welcome the pain, takes the edge off of my broken heart.” Harry mumbled and ended it with a laugh that had no humor or meaning behind it. Just a simple sound. He did not mean to say that much out loud but there it was. Harry blames the fall for making him act like this man really cares about his problems.

“Well, without pain, there’s no way for a human to grow from the past.” The man spoke, giving a simple shrug. “Heartache teaches us what to avoid in life that lead up to this moment. Heartache means you’re going down the right path even though it may not feel like it at the time of the pain.”

Harry stared at him for a second before he slowly gave a smile and looked down. “Wow. Those are some really deep words, Mr. Stranger.”

The man laughed softly. “Louis. My name is Louis. Nice to meet you.”

Harry looked back up to the outstretched hand and then smiled more, easily taking it in his own. “Harry. Nice to meet you, too, Louis.” He said softly. “But this also pegs the new question of why you are here and how exactly did you get in?”

“Well, the door was open and you were dancing to no music which I now see you had playing in your headphones—”

Harry laughed. “No, I meant the building. It was locked.”

“Well, then how did you get in?” Louis shot back with a raised eyebrow and a small smile.

“I happen to have a key. You’re avoiding my question.” Harry said instantly, seemingly forgetting his problems right now and instead focusing mainly on the way that Louis was making him smile. The easy banter they had. It was easy to talk to this stranger.

“I’m not avoiding your question. Maybe asking you questions gives you the answer to your questions.” Louis said simply and laughed under his breath, leaning forward and resting his chin against his knee to gaze at Harry.

Harry really felt like he was being given his entire attention. He has never felt that before. Like anyone truly cared about what he had to say at all to the point where he was anyone’s sole focus. It was refreshing. “Well, I haven’t seen you around so you don’t have a key. You couldn’t. And I’m pretty sure you didn’t break in… Did I leave the door unlocked?”

“Bingo. See, context clues.” Louis laughed. “I was walking to my car and saw someone running into the building and the curiosity got the best of me. Bold of me to assume I wouldn’t be harmed, yes, but I took the chance anyways. By the time I got here, the door was still half open and I assume that’s because you were in a hurry and then looked around to see if I could find whoever it was. And upon inspection and getting lost once, I ended up here. Just in time, too, because you obviously created quite the scene.”

Harry looked down at that point with a small blush. “I suppose what we both did was rather dangerous. I could have been murdered leaving open the door by either a murderer or my mentor who gave me the key in the first place. Whoever got to me first for being reckless.” He said with a small chuckle.

“Seriously, though… Are you actually alright? You hit the floor pretty hard.” Louis said softly with a soft smile that seemed pained as he remembered how hard Harry hit the floor before he ran in there.

“Oh, yeah. Nothing is broken. Just another day, I’ve done worse.” Harry said with a small smile. “I even had to do a show with a sprained wrist and had to lift a girl in the air and do a cartwheel. So, it’s nothing bad.”

Louis laughed softly. “Strong willed and a strong pain tolerance. Two good traits.”

“Yeah, I suppose.” Harry gave a soft sigh as if he didn’t exactly believe the words himself. 

“Want to talk about it?” Louis asked him, voice softer.

“I don’t think you want to know my silly little sob story.” Harry said softly, shrugging his shoulders slightly.

“Seeing as you seemed a bit erratic about it, I don’t think that it matters whether it’s a little sob story to me. Its not to you and that’s what I care about.” Louis said with a shrug. “Who am I to judge the level of seriousness in someone else’s life anyways? If it hurts then it hurts. Everyone is different.”

Harry just stared at this man with fascination. Everything he said was like poetry and Harry never wanted him to stop speaking. Even though he had just met him. “I bet you write poetry.”

Louis barked out a laugh and sat straighter. “I do not.”

“You should, then.” Harry nodded. “You seem to have a way with words.”

“Thank you, Harry.” Louis smiled. “You’re avoiding the conversation.”

“Fine. I just got dumped.” Harry sighed softly.

“Now why would that be a silly sob story? Breaking up with someone does hurt and its valid to be upset.” Louis said instantly, moving his legs to sit criss cross instead and leaned down against his hands with his elbows on his knees.

“It’s just… I guess I over romanticize relationships that I am in and I want to move too fast and need to learn when someone doesn’t love me. At least that is what I was told.” Harry sighed and reached his hands up to his face while he slouched down. “So, here’s the thing. You better be ready because you got me going. Now you’re going to get the entire story.”

Louis smiled at him and just nodded his head to let Harry continue speaking. Why he was pouring his entire heart out to this well-spoken poetic stranger at close to ten at night in the closed dance studio/school of dance, he had no idea. But he was going through a lot of feelings and there was actually someone who wanted to talk to him and actually would listen to him so he took the chance and he was running with it. It was either this or doing more angry dances he really can’t do and hurting himself and having to stay there until the next morning all broken and bruised before someone found him to bring him help. The lesser of two evils, it seemed.

Harry took in a deep breath, then started his rant. “Okay. So, I met this one guy in high school. I was in dance and on the school’s dance team and he was in student council and was involved in a lot of the clubs after school... His name is Xander. He was super popular and everyone loved him. I thought he was so cute but obviously I wasn’t about to go up to the popular kid and embarrass myself because he wouldn’t know who this scrawny little gay kid on the dance team was. But then one day during lunch, he sat down with me and we started to talk. That was the beginning. He approached me and he kept approaching me and was the one who started up the relationship. He tried hard until he knew he got me. I know that’s what he did but I was so in love with him… I was too blind to see it.

“Anyways, I really fell for this boy. He was charming and I couldn’t believe this boy who everyone loved was into me and with me. It was unbelievable. But he eventually stopped being over the top with me and I started to be the one that planned our dates and I made sure that he was happy because if he was happy, I was happy. I loved him, god… I loved him. I still love him. But I guess that was one sided. We were going strong, I thought for so long that I was going to marry him. I was waiting for four years for him to drop on one knee one day and he never did. And then today, we had a date because he was leaving town tomorrow for two weeks and our anniversary was next week so I planned a nice romantic picnic and… I asked him about it. Our future together. And he got mad. Started to tell me that I was rushing into things and this was my fault and he didn’t love me for years because I was forcing him into so many things and he wasn’t ready for anything more.” Harry had to stop and looked down, sniffling and shaking his head a bit.

Louis was silent that whole time, letting Harry vent and once he seemed to get a bit choked up and emotional, he moved over to sit next to him more. He placed a hand against his shoulder and smiled softly to encourage him to keep going. He seemed to really need someone to vent to.

“Sorry, um… Yeah. So, I guess I was taking things too far for him and he felt trapped. He didn’t want us to last this long but he didn’t want to hurt my feelings earlier? I don’t know… But yeah. He left me there and I had to pathetically take everything down I had set up. It was so embarrassing, Louis. People were staring and I was trying so hard not to cry... So, it’s all in my car and I changed into this that I had in my duffle bag instead of the nice clothes I wore and I drove here because I couldn’t think of going anywhere else. I figured maybe dancing would get out my frustrations.” Harry sniffled a bit. It did feel a bit better getting that all out and off his chest. He could have told his mother but he would have felt horrible for wasting her time and crying to her since she has always listened to him and his problems. He didn’t want to bother her.

“It seems to me that he wasn’t worth your time and he definitely isn’t worth your tears.” Louis spoke after a solid moment of silence, moving to wrap his arm around Harry's shoulder to pull him in for a hug. Which seemed to be the gesture that unlocked the floodgates and caused Harry to give a soft heartbreaking sob before he hid his face against Louis’ chest and wrapped his own arms around his waist. “Okay, alright… A good cry is nice to get out. Go ahead. You’re going to be okay. You are young and this sounds like the first breakup. They’re always the worst. Its only ever rare people from high school stay together and its nice to let yourself explore and not get tied down anyways. Imagine all the things you can do without someone there to hold you back.”

“I-I love him!” Harry cried out, making Louis nod.

“I know, love, I know…” Louis breathed out softly and gently rubbed his back with a soft sigh. They definitely didn’t know anything about each other but heartache really does bring people together whether they’re formally strangers or already friends. He kept Harry held close and just let him cry and get it out. He didn’t mind it. He knew what it felt like to have a broken heart and he doesn’t wish that on anyone. Not even an enemy.

They stayed like this through the night before they both knew it and had fallen asleep wrapped up in one another.

Harry woke up on the floor with a kick to his side and a stern look from his instructor. He gave a small groan and then leaned his head back against the floor with his eyes closed. That wasn’t good… Just one bad thing after another.


End file.
